a history of the Grand Canyon in 5 parts
In just a few days I will embark on a trip I’ve been dreaming about since childhood: two weeks whitewater rafting on the Colorado River. Two weeks with no cell service, no internet, no connection to everyday life. Two weeks navigating one of the world’s wildest and most iconic rivers with a group of strangers. Two weeks exploring the magic of the Grand Canyon from within.
Rightfully, the Grand Canyon is one of the world’s most iconic natural features, one that inspires art and activism in equal measure. I feel that before I descend into it, it’s my responsibility to learn as much about it as I can.
So what follows is a very brief history of a very large canyon and some of the most important, contentious, and personal narratives that surround it.
Geologic
The majority of the Grand Canyon’s history takes place long before human existence. Our Earth is 4.5 billion years old, and the first rocks of the Grand Canyon were formed around 2 billion years ago, making the foundations of the canyon half as old as the planet itself.
The oldest rock in the canyon, and the one I’m most excited to see, is called the Vishnu Schist. Originally formed in a deep ocean trench, the Vishnu Schist is 1.75 billion years old, just a little younger than multicellular life itself.
Deep beneath the ocean’s surface, sedimentary rocks were deposited atop the original igneous and metamorphic schist, creating horizontal layers with unique ages and histories.
Geologists are unsure exactly how, but plate tectonics uplifted the entire Colorado Plateau without altering or damaging the existing rock layers. Rocks that had been formed at the bottom of the ocean were now high above sea level, waiting to be uncovered.
7-10 million years ago, the Colorado River began that task, slowly carving through the Colorado Plateau, exposing ancient rock and forming the canyon.
The Colorado River is steep, swift, and carries a high volume of water, especially during floods. Because of this, it is an effective architect of the Grand Canyon, cutting through bedrock and tossing aside boulders. Flood events are particularly powerful agents of transformation, carrying up to 300,000 cubic feet of water per second.
The river continued to sculpt the Grand Canyon for 5-6 million years, creating the geologic marvel we see today. The canyon is dynamic. Much has changed since then and much will continue to change as the river winds its way through the landscape, uncovering ancient rocks and depositing new ones.
Indigenous
The history of the Grand Canyon, and indeed everywhere in the United States, is incomplete without acknowledging Indigenous peoples.
There is evidence of human activity in the Grand Canyon dating back to the Ice Age, approximately 11,000 years ago. Whether early peoples lived in the Grand Canyon, occupied it seasonally, or simply passed through is unclear, but archaeological data suggest an evolution of hunting practices as the climate in North America changed.
Year-round inhabitance of the Grand Canyon started around 4,000 years ago and people lived consistently in and around the canyon for the next several thousand years.
Ancestral Puebloans (sometimes referred to as Anasazi) constructed cliff dwellings and created pictographic art on the canyon walls. Sometime around 1300, the Ancestral Pueblo people rapidly fled the Grand Canyon, likely due to environmental stress and violence, though researchers are unsure exactly what transpired. These people are the ancestors to more than 75,000 Pueblo individuals currently residing in the American Southwest.
After the flight of the Ancestral Puebloans, other Indigenous tribes moved into the region. Within the Grand Canyon itself, the Havasupai and Hualapai migrated between the canyon floor and the outer plateau, constructing complex irrigation systems to support agriculture and hunting along the canyon rims.
In the 1800s, settlers came to the Southwest, inciting violence and displacing the Havasupai and Hualapai from their ancestral lands. When the Grand Canyon became a National Park in 1919, Indigenous tribes were restricted from accessing it, instead forced to reside within reservations created by the federal government.
There are 11 Tribal Nations with cultural connections to the Grand Canyon still living in the area: the Havasupai, the Hopi, the Hualapai, the Kaibab Paiute, the Las Vegas Paiute, the Moapa Paiute, the Utah Paiute, the San Juan Southern Paiute, the Navajo (Diné), the Pueblo of Zuni, and the Yavapai-Apache.
Recently, Indigenous communities have been fighting for their right to access ancestral lands within Grand Canyon National Park and practice traditional agricultural and land management techniques.
There is still a profoundly long way to go in repairing the physical and cultural damage done to the peoples of the Grand Canyon, but Indigenous voices and presence have started to be included in park management. Indigenous naturalists act as river and canyon guides and Indigenous history is included in park information.
It is critical to remember that visiting the Grand Canyon is not a vacation, but a sojourn to a sacred place that has been stewarded by Indigenous peoples for thousands of years.
U.S. Environmentalism
154 years ago to the week, Major John Wesley Powell conducted the first geographic survey of the Green and Colorado Rivers in the U.S. He and his crew completed the 1,000-mile journey in approximately 100 days, enduring the loss of two boats, three crew members, and most of their food. This expedition marked the beginning of the Grand Canyon’s impact on the collective consciousness of the United States.
The late 1800s marked a rise in tourism and the canyon underwent several different titles, including that of “National Monument” bestowed by Teddy Roosevelt, before finally becoming a National Park in 1919.
During the 1900s, the creation of national parks belied an attitude of human supremacy over the landscape. Dams were constructed on nearly every river in the continental U.S., including the Colorado.
In the 1950s, a plan for one such dam inspired one of the greatest environmental battles in American history. Set to flood Dinosaur National Monument, the dam was loudly and fiercely decried by the Sierra Club.
As a compromise, the federal government agreed to construct a dam in little-known Glen Canyon instead. When David Brower, then executive director of the Sierra Club visited Glen Canyon, he was devastated to see that he had condemned one of the most tranquil and beautiful locations he’d ever seen to be flooded.
It was too late to undo the decision, and Glen Canyon Dam remains one of the most controversial in the U.S., but the fight over the Grand Canyon proved the effectiveness and tenacity of environmentalists working together.
Water Rights
As evidenced by the fight over Dinosaur National Monument and the Glen Canyon Dam, water inspires conflict in the Grand Canyon.
The Colorado River provides water to seven U.S. states and Mexico, with California using the largest share. Some states have not needed their full water allocations, and California has benefitted from this, but as populations increase and droughts become more frequent, Colorado River water is becoming scarcer.
Additionally, the original Colorado River Compact assigned water rights based on inaccurate annual flow data. The amount of water in the river was overestimated, stretching water rights thin from the beginning and leaving Mexico with a trickle at the river’s terminus.
The Compact also neglected to provide water rights to Indigenous peoples who have historically relied on the Colorado River. Although some Tribal Nations have been able to acquire water rights, the legal intricacies of market and ownership are still ambiguous.
The flow rate of the Colorado River continues to decline as populations in the Southwest increase, and just this week a deal was struck between California, Nevada, and Arizona to collectively take 13% less water over the next few years in exchange for federal compensation.
Water politics are always contentious in the West, and while this deal is a bureaucratic victory, it is still only a band-aid for the massive water shortages we’ll face in the future.
Family
The history of the Grand Canyon is dense and fraught, covering a wide array of topics from science to politics to Indigenous rights. So I’ll end with some personal history, a taste of my family’s relationship to the Colorado River.
In 1997, my parents rafted the Colorado River and I grew up hearing about the rapids, the rocks, the water so full of sediment it looked like chocolate milk. I dreamed about what it would feel like to hurtle through Lava Falls or brush my fingers against the Vishnu Schist.
I was lucky enough to get to go on smaller rafting trips as a child. My parents took me on a handful of trips in Oregon and Idaho and I absolutely fell in love with the serenity of the backcountry and the thrill of the whitewater. Rafting is nature’s rollercoaster.
And when I was in middle school we took a road trip to some of the great National Parks of the Southwest: Bryce, Zion, Mesa Verde, and of course, the Grand Canyon.
I stood on the North Rim and looked out over a fissure in the Earth so massive I could barely comprehend it. I looked down toward the canyon floor and imagined myself gliding through the cathedral-like walls on the Colorado River.
The time has finally come for me to realize the childhood dream. I’ll descend into the canyon, drift along the Colorado, and remember all of the history – geologic, political, Indigenous, familial – that brought me to this point.
I’ve covered a lot of history here, and I know I’ve barely scratched the surface, but I also know there is something intangible to be learned from the canyon and the river. Something that can only be unlocked by experiencing it. Something I absolutely can’t wait to find out.
A special shoutout to The Emerald Mile by Kevin Fedarko for providing much of the unlinked information and a fascinating perspective on the Colorado River.